Dan, I can't believe all that franchise role offered you was $1500-2000 before taxes. Analysts should be in high demand in cricket. The fact that they are not because the teams don't see the value is perplexing. I love when watching a match, when they show the graphic on the pitch of where the bowlers have been bowling by percentage. Or how in the T20 WC, the graphics showing the difference in the bounce of the ball between the various Caribbean pitches. All of that is useful information, that should be analysed and be interpreted for competitive advantage in all competitions. For example, is there a stat that captures the average amount of seconds it takes between a ball being hit within the boundary for the fielders to run down, intercept, and throw the ball back to the bowler or wicketkepper? Now team owners might dismiss this as irrelevant, but it isn't. Consider this scenario: if the analyst of the batting side clocked that on average the opposing side's fielders were last in the league at running balls down and returning them for run outs, then the analyst could share that data with the coach who shares it to the team, instructing them to run for 2 as often as they can even if it is close, because the fielding team on average takes a 0.9 seconds slower to run down their balls than any team in the league. Obviously, after 2 or 3 times where the batting team runs for 2, the fielding team will wise up to the batters taking advantage of their slothful fielding and adjust. Data like that could make the difference between winning or losing, and in certain circumstances keep a hot batter on strike! You could imagine a similar stat for a batting partnership, where one batter is a fast runner but the other is not, making the time it takes for both of them to run to the crease to be a certain amount of seconds. The analyst, knowing that a certain partnership takes longer to run between the creases than the league average, could model that data before the match based on the potential partnerships that might arise in the match (which would depend on wickets taken), share that data with the coach, who shares it with the team. So that in the event wickets fall and that partnership is in the crease, the fielding team could strategize to get a run out to make another wicket fall. So you could have another mode of dismissal where the fielding team coaxes the partnership into attempting to run a two with some sort of intentional overthrow subterfuge designed like a set play in football, with the intention to get a run out. Again, you do that a couple times, the batting team wises up, but if you get a big wicket off a play like that it could shift the momentum in the match. How could team owners feel cricket analytics isn't valuable?!
Absolutely. I am a masters student at NYU with a huge interest in cricket analytics. This article is very relatable to be. Especially the last 2 months, my friends back in India and I were discussing a lot about how cricket analytics is essentially helping RR thrive in the last 4 years. We did a lot of work on SRH (our favourite team) and realised we need to do more on other teams too and cannot isolate one team and get any better results. I am eagerly waiting for the retentions and releases list and want to build the greatest SRH squad, purely based on data and not the emotions attached to star players. This will be my capstone maybe. If not, a hobby project at least.
Dan, I can't believe all that franchise role offered you was $1500-2000 before taxes. Analysts should be in high demand in cricket. The fact that they are not because the teams don't see the value is perplexing. I love when watching a match, when they show the graphic on the pitch of where the bowlers have been bowling by percentage. Or how in the T20 WC, the graphics showing the difference in the bounce of the ball between the various Caribbean pitches. All of that is useful information, that should be analysed and be interpreted for competitive advantage in all competitions. For example, is there a stat that captures the average amount of seconds it takes between a ball being hit within the boundary for the fielders to run down, intercept, and throw the ball back to the bowler or wicketkepper? Now team owners might dismiss this as irrelevant, but it isn't. Consider this scenario: if the analyst of the batting side clocked that on average the opposing side's fielders were last in the league at running balls down and returning them for run outs, then the analyst could share that data with the coach who shares it to the team, instructing them to run for 2 as often as they can even if it is close, because the fielding team on average takes a 0.9 seconds slower to run down their balls than any team in the league. Obviously, after 2 or 3 times where the batting team runs for 2, the fielding team will wise up to the batters taking advantage of their slothful fielding and adjust. Data like that could make the difference between winning or losing, and in certain circumstances keep a hot batter on strike! You could imagine a similar stat for a batting partnership, where one batter is a fast runner but the other is not, making the time it takes for both of them to run to the crease to be a certain amount of seconds. The analyst, knowing that a certain partnership takes longer to run between the creases than the league average, could model that data before the match based on the potential partnerships that might arise in the match (which would depend on wickets taken), share that data with the coach, who shares it with the team. So that in the event wickets fall and that partnership is in the crease, the fielding team could strategize to get a run out to make another wicket fall. So you could have another mode of dismissal where the fielding team coaxes the partnership into attempting to run a two with some sort of intentional overthrow subterfuge designed like a set play in football, with the intention to get a run out. Again, you do that a couple times, the batting team wises up, but if you get a big wicket off a play like that it could shift the momentum in the match. How could team owners feel cricket analytics isn't valuable?!
Absolutely. I am a masters student at NYU with a huge interest in cricket analytics. This article is very relatable to be. Especially the last 2 months, my friends back in India and I were discussing a lot about how cricket analytics is essentially helping RR thrive in the last 4 years. We did a lot of work on SRH (our favourite team) and realised we need to do more on other teams too and cannot isolate one team and get any better results. I am eagerly waiting for the retentions and releases list and want to build the greatest SRH squad, purely based on data and not the emotions attached to star players. This will be my capstone maybe. If not, a hobby project at least.